


Cold Cold Man

by Anonymous



Category: Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz
Genre: Abandonment, Angst, Kink Meme, M/M, Retirement, Reunions, Spies & Secret Agents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:07:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25734808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Written for the following kinkmeme prompt:AU where John survives and successfully begins a new life. Yassen meets him years later and questions whether John ever truly cared about him, or if it was all part of his cover.Snakehead and Russian Roulette disagree in continuity, so I'd prefer the Snakehead version of events. Yassen never knew that John was a double agent and believed he died on Albert Bridge in Scorpia, so is utterly blindsided to find him alive.
Relationships: Yassen Gregorovich/John Rider
Comments: 12
Kudos: 30
Collections: anonymous





	Cold Cold Man

Yassen sits alone at one of the outdoor tables of the cafe, taking in his surroundings. Nearby, a flock of pigeons stand on the ledge of a fountain, taking turns diving into the water, and Yassen absentmindedly sweeps the crumbs leftover from his pastry at them, playing the part of the harmless tourist on summer holiday.

Someone slides into the seat across from him, and Yassen stills. He has been in the game for almost two decades, and he strains to remember the last time someone has managed to sneak up on him. _Alex Rider in Cornwall_ , he thinks. Yassen forcibly pushes the memory of young Alex Rider out his head to focus on the present threat.

“Mind if I join you?” The man is late middle aged, his brown hair streaked with grey. The face and the voice have aged considerably, but his mannerisms have not changed in the years since Yassen saw him last.

“You’re supposed to be dead.” Yassen is unable to hide a small bit of surprise and uncertainty from creeping into his voice, and he feels a surge of annoyance with himself. John Rider had trained him and made love to him, but the last time they saw each other was eighteen years ago. Obviously, he didn’t mean anything to him, for him to not reach out after all this time. Yassen attempts to smother the last vestiges of any lingering sentimentality that he has for John. His betrayal was a footnote in a life filled with it.

“I could say the same about you.” Cold brown eyes meet equally cold blue ones.

Yassen acknowledges the accusation with a slight tilt of his head. “Fancy meeting after all these years. What brings you here?”

“I _live_ here. What brings you here?”

Yassen bites back a bark of harsh laughter. Could it be coincidence that brings them together, after so long apart? A part of him wonders if this is a trap, and he studies John’s face intently. John hasn’t changed much, but Yassen has two additional decades of wetwork under his belt since they last met, and now he draws on the experience to examine John and conclude that he is telling the truth. Yassen gives a slight shrug. “Looking for a place to retire.”

“Really.” John’s voice drips with skepticism.

“Really.” Yassen forces himself to maintain eye contact with John, and they both sit there, saying nothing. Yassen begins to wonder if he should have told a lie instead when John replies.

“Fancy coming back to my place for a drink? Something stronger than coffee.” John flicks his gaze to the empty cup in front of Yassen.

*

John leads Yassen to a house not fifteen minutes away from the town square. It is at the end of a cul-de-sac, the garden overgrown with weeds that come halfway up Yassen’s knee. The first thing Yassen notices when he steps inside is a coffee table littered with empty wine bottles. He looks away. Somehow, alcoholism isn’t something that he would have associated with John.

John steps over to a cabinet in the corner of the room, where he begins to fix drinks for the both of them. “Whisky ok?”

“Sure.” Yassen remembers that whisky has always been John’s favorite. He accepts the offered glass and they settle down together on the couch.

John lifts his glass up in a toast. “To retirement.”

Yassen brings his glass up to meet his. “To retirement,” he echoes, but it sounds hollow to himself. 

*

The next thing Yassen knows, they’ve wandered into John’s bed. He can hear John strip off his shirt and pants, and he feels the bed shift as John settles in beside him. John turns out to be every bit as violent and merciless as Yassen remembers. Yassen also remembers a time when they fucked after every job to bleed off the adrenaline. A time where he enjoyed it, a time where he _lived_ for it. There is no job this time, there hasn’t been for a while, but Yassen lays there anyway and lets John take him. Yassen has never said no to John, and he doesn’t want to start now.

Afterwards, they find themselves lingering in bed, sweaty and dirty and silent and tangled up in the sheets. Yassen rolls over to look at John. He needs to know what happened in the intervening years, and if he doesn’t ask now, he’s afraid that he won’t get a chance to. “So — what have you been up to all this while?”

“I’ve been living here this whole time.” The layer of dust on the coffee table outside looked like no one has cleaned in years, and this bit of information doesn’t surprise Yassen.

“How is Helen?”

“She left me. Ten years ago.” Yassen senses a slight tinge of pain in John’s voice, despite the years that have passed, and he wonders if she’s the reason why there are so many bottles outside.

“Happy endings don't exist in our line of work,” Yassen says quietly, repeating a line that John told him two decades ago. “How did you get out of prison — after Malta?”

John remains silent for a long while, and Yassen is just beginning to wonder if he should change the subject when John replies. “I didn’t. I was working undercover for MI6 that whole time I was with Scorpia. Another line of work that doesn’t have happy endings.” John gives a bitter laugh at that.

Over the years, Yassen has accumulated a number of theories for what happened to John Rider after Malta, but this certainly isn’t one of them. “What about Alex?” Yassen thinks back to the boy — now man — whose path has intersected with his numerous times. Winces internally as he remembers the words he had spoken to Alex when he thought he was dying on Air Force One and the fallout that had resulted from Alex looking for the man his father was.

Something flashes through John’s eyes, but it’s gone before Yassen can identify it. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Yassen prides himself on having near-perfect control over his emotions; it’s clear to him today that the Rider men are the only exception to the rule. Perhaps it is the cruel parallels between Alex’s life and his own that stirs up the anger in him. And to think it could all have been avoided… “You left him to fend for himself,” he accuses. “He was fourteen when MI6 recruited him to play spy.”

“I left him with Ian,” John snaps. “All this wouldn’t have happened if Helen had gotten that stupid abortion when I told her to.”

Yassen stares at John for a long moment, looking for any sign of remorse for the position that he had placed Alex in. Was this the same man that had mentored him all those years ago? Suddenly, Yassen has the feeling that he’s lying in bed with a dangerous snake, and his senses are screaming at him to get out of there.

John must have sensed something as well, because he rolls over to look at Yassen. “Don’t leave me. I missed you, Yassen.”

Outside of sex, this is the most emotion that Yassen has ever heard from John. He pauses buttoning his shirt and turns to look at him. “All those years ago. You trained me, you made me who I am. I treated you like the father figure I didn’t have. Did you care at all?”

Yassen doesn’t wait for a reply, simply resumes his preparations to leave. There is nothing John can say that will make him change his mind now. At the doorway, Yassen pauses and turns around for a final time. John has pulled himself up to lean on the headboard, and he’s staring at him with empty eyes.

It’s crystal clear to Yassen what John Rider has been this whole time, and Yassen hates himself for being so blind to it all. The words slip out of him before he realizes. “I would say to go to hell, but I think you’re already there.” Yassen leaves without looking back.


End file.
